Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou started on monday a 12-day trip to China, marking the first visit to mainland China by a former leader of the island since the two sides broke up in 1949 over civil war, according to Kyodo News.
Ma, a leading member of Taiwan’s main opposition Nationalist Party, is scheduled to travel to cities including Shanghai, Nanjing and Wuhan and meet with local students, according to the pro-China political party, also called the Kuomintang (KMT).
Beijing is not included in his itinerary, but Ma could meet a senior Chinese official during his visit. In February, KMT Vice Chairman Andrew Hsia held talks with senior Chinese officials during his trip to mainland China.
Ma’s visit, who met Chinese President Xi Jinping at a historic 2015 summit in Singapore, comes amid increased Chinese military pressure on the self-ruled democratic island and efforts to alienate allies from her, Honduras being the last state to change its diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing.
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However, Beijing appears to be adjusting its hawkish policy ahead of Taiwan’s presidential election scheduled for next January, and Chinese leaders have recently stressed mainland China’s desire to move forward with a “peaceful reunification” process with the island.
Relations between the two sides of the strait have deteriorated since Tsai Ing-wen of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (PDP) became the island’s president in 2016.
Some DPP members have criticized Ma’s trip days after Honduras cut ties with Taipei in favor of Beijing, urging the former president to cancel the visit to the mainland to protest the establishment of relations between China and the Central American country announced on Saturday.
Beijing is not included in his itinerary, but Ma could meet a senior Chinese official during his visit.
Taiwan maintains that China used economic incentives to lure Honduras, the ninth country to cut ties with Taiwan since Tsai became president.
Ma told reporters before his departure from Taipei airport that he was “glad” to visit mainland China, as some protesters called him a “traitor”.
Beijing has welcomed Ma’s trip to China, and Ma Xiaoguang, spokesman for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, last week expressed Beijing’s willingness to facilitate his trip, during which the former leader will present his pay respects to their ancestors before the Qingming tomb-sweeping festival on April 5.
The spokesperson stressed that honoring ancestors is a tradition shared by people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. Ma was born in Hong Kong and the graves of his ancestors are in the Chinese province of Hunan.
He also praised the youth exchanges planned during Ma’s trip, which will be joined by a group of Taiwanese students, saying they can “create new momentum for the peaceful development” of cross-strait relations.
During the trip, Ma plans to visit places related to Chinese revolutionary and KMT founder Sun Yat-sen and the memorial dedicated to the victims of the 1937 Nanjing massacre committed by Japanese troops.
Although communist-led China has never ruled Taiwan, it views the island as a renegade province that must be unified with the mainland by force if necessary.
